One of the seven pathfinding first astronauts, Walter M. “Wally” Schirra Jr. graduated from the Naval Academy in 1945 and would retire as a captain. A naval aviator and test pilot, he was the only astronaut with Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo missions. Along with the thrills and each new milestone, there were hair-raising moments, as he recounts in the 1988 Naval Institute Press Bluejacket book, Schirra’s Space.
In October 1965, Schirra and astronaut Tom Stafford were on board the two-man Gemini 6 spacecraft ready to launch. They were to lift off after the unmanned Agena Target Vehicle, then rendezvous and dock with the vehicle as it completed its first orbit—the first rendezvous of two spacecraft. Unfortunately, the Agena blew up before reaching orbit. People thought fast, and a new plan began to take shape.
Schirra recalls the mission in these edited excerpts.
Gemini 7 was scheduled to begin a two-week mission in early December. If Gemini 6 could be sent up while Gemini 7 was still in orbit, we could rendezvous with Gemini 7 as the target vehicle. A rapid-fire double launch was a tremendous challenge; to rendezvous with Gemini 7, we were scheduled to fly eight days after Frank Borman and Jim Lovell.
On Sunday morning, December 12, Gemini 7 was in the ninth day of orbital flight. Tom and I were back in our spacecraft. The countdown went well, and at 9:54 we had engine ignition. Three, two, one, liftoff. No, no liftoff. These were tense moments. The engines had shut down, but an electrical plug dropped from the base of the booster, activating a liftoff programmer. If we had lifted off so much as a foot, and then the engines had shut down, 150 tons of propellants encased in a fragile metal shell would have exploded, and Stafford and I would have been engulfed in flames.
The rule book called for me to pull a D-ring beneath my couch that would have ignited an ejection rocket and sent Tom and me to safety. We might have suffered fractures and internal injuries but probably would have survived. Tom had his own D-ring and could have initiated ejection, but he had given me the nod and sat tight.
Gemini 6 finally made it into orbit on the morning of December 15. As we passed over the African continent, Borman and Lovell got a glimpse of our contrail. Over the Pacific, I turned the spacecraft 90 degrees to the south and ignited the aft thrusters. By the end of the burn, we were in the same plane as Gemini 7, with the gap reduced to 300 miles. As we got within a half mile of Gemini 7, I maneuvered with tender care. Then, as we moved within 100 feet, it was necessary to stop our velocity in relation to the velocity of Gemini 7, or we would have whizzed right on by.
“Having fun?” I radioed to Gemini 7 when we were 200 feet apart.
“Hello there,” Borman replied.
“There seems to be a lot of traffic up here,” I noted.
“Call a policeman,” Borman said.
All four of us were overjoyed. We had done something we had spent years preparing for. We flew in formation for three revolutions of the Earth, moving from a range of 100 yards to just inches, window to window, nose to nose. Using my “eyeball ranging system,” I did an in-plane flyaround of Gemini 7, like a crew chief inspecting an aircraft. I could see icicles hanging from one side and sunlight reflected by the gold surface of the Mylar heat shield. I was amazed at my ability to maneuver, controlling altitude with my right hand and translating in every direction by igniting the big thrusters with my left. Tom and I took turns, shared the altitude stick between us.
With the rendezvous completed, we were ready to come home. “Really a good job, Frank and Jim,” I said to Gemini 7. “We’ll see you on the beach.”
